There are so many different reasons why a child can develop hip dysplasia. This reason alone can make it difficult for doctors to pin point why it happens. For instance, your newborn baby is a girl, and she seems perfectly healthy and normal in every other area. In this case, your baby being a girl is the only reason for the dysplasia. That is why this particular condition can be hard to diagnose early on.
Hip dysplasia can be very tricky to find. Sometimes symptoms do not show up until your child is several months old. There are some cases where both hips are compromised making the diagnoses even more challenging. This condition is easier to treat the sooner you find it. That is why most infants will endure a surgery to correct the condition.
A reminder of the list of symptoms for Hip Dysplasia:
• A click or popping when the hip is rotated
• There is not full range of motion
• The legs are two different lengths
• The hip joint is not very flexible
If you have any concerns that your child could be having dysplasia, it is important to make an appointment with your child’s doctor, especially if the child is a girl. It is better to be on the safe side then to let the condition go.
My wife recently talked about how to keep your child dry with the use of feminine pads. There were some questions about exactly how it was done, so we took some pictures. Below is my wife explaining how we did it. I hope the pictures help!
Wife’s Explanation:
I am going to try to explain each picture the best that I can. This is Natalie’s second cast that the doctor’s office let my mom keep. Natalie’s second cast only covered part of her left leg so it looks a little different then a lot of other spica casts.
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| (Click on the pictures to enlarge them.) |
You can see how the pads are placed through the back of the cast. You will put the cotton side of the pad toward their skin. You do not have to peel the paper off the back. This will actually make it more difficult to get the pad in the right place. Just use the white medical tape to keep it in place.
• Remember do not force anything in your child’s cast. If they do not slide easily into to place, you may have to find a different method.
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| (Click on the pictures to enlarge them.) |
This area is the inside of the leg from different views. This is where you cut one pad in half. You place one half on the inside of the leg. You will want some of the pad on the inside and some on the outside. This will keep the material on the inner thigh area dry and the material on the outside of the cast dry as well. One pad should be enough for both legs.
I hope that this makes it easier to understand I know that doing all of this makes the cast really ugly, but the cast itself is not much better. It is the price that is paid for the comfort of your child.
This is a topic that I do not have a lot of information about. I can image how difficult it would be to find a day care that would even consider taking in a child that is in a spica cast. Since I am lucky enough to be a stay at home mom, we did not have to consider who would take care of Natalie while she was in her cast.
I am not sure how much a regular day care would be able to keep up with the needs of a child who is in a full body cast. Most day cares only staff enough people to take care of children without special needs. For more money, they might allow a child to continue to attend. Even if this is possible would it be the kind of quality care that your child would need?
I think that the best way to go would be to check into a local day care that handles special needs children on a regular basis. This would probably be more expensive, but the people here would most likely be more qualified to take care of a child in a spica cast. It would likely only be for a short period of time so it would be worth checking into.
There is a website that is dedicated to finding child care for any one. It is www.Care.com. It allows you to look at available child care sitters that are listed in your area. They have a page for special needs children where the sitters are educated or experienced with special needs children. You can sign up for a free account or pay for the premium packages. The premium packages offer free background checks. The site also shows if the sitter is full time or part time, and how much the sitter charges per hour. This seems like a great option to try out. It would most likely be expensive since instead of the typical weekly rates, you pay by the hour.
Child care can be a difficult decision to make especially when it comes to a child who definitely needs a lot of care. I hope that this will help any one who has concern about how and who will help take care of their precious little bundle during a difficult time. Also, if anyone else has any ideas or solution feel free to add to this information by posting a comment. It would be greatly appreciated.
We recently found out that we are going to be adding a little girl to our family. This will be the third little girl. I feel slightly sorry for their dad being the only guy, but my dad survived three girls so I figure he can too. At least I think he will be able too. Anyways, this has brought about some concerns on my part.
Little girls are more likely to have DDH according to statistics. It is also common if you have had one child with DDH the next one following is likely to have the same condition. I have not really found out why this happens, maybe someone who has experienced this may have more answers. I am trying to prepare myself for what might come in about four and half months. I am not trying to be pessimistic. I am simply telling myself that I can do this again, if I have to.
I asked the ultrasound technician if there was any way they can tell in advance if a baby has DDH. He said as far as he knows there is no early test. It can be difficult enough to diagnose after they are born through ultrasound. So we will have to wait and see what our little bundle brings us.
This is kind of a false title because I do not know if you can be fully prepared to hear the news that your child may never walk correctly or with out pain. That is one of the first things that I heard the doctor tell me about Natalie. That is until he said “with out surgery of course.”
The word surgery slapped me across the face that day in the doctor’s office. I was so stunned I know I did not hear all of the conversation going on around me. Here I was bringing my daughter to an appointment where I thought the doctor would say something like “She will grow out of this, we only worry when the bones are curved as well” or “I think that if she wore a brace for a little while it will help.” I thought well she is only slightly bow-legged surely it will correct itself with out much help.
I was completely unprepared for the rest of the appointment. He brought in the x-rays and you could see without assistance that her little leg was not in the proper place. Her left hip looked perfectly normal, in the right spot, growing normally. Her right leg was nowhere near where it should be. It was like an inch higher than the other side. I was shocked. All I could do was sit there. I could not even form a rational thought. I just sat holding her in my arms thinking this is not happening.
I wish that I had known what I was walking into that day. I had asked my dad to drive us to the city because I did not know where I was going. I was so glad because he asked several questions for me. He made sure that surgery was necessary. He asked things like how long till she would recover. How long would she be in the cast? You know important questions that I could not even begin to put together. I was so very thankful that he was there with me and that I did not go alone. My original thoughts were that I would be going alone, thank goodness I wasn’t. I do not think that I could have handled it.
Many of you already know before you see the surgeon what you are dealing with. I wish now I would have asked her regular doctor to check her more thoroughly on that particular visit. Maybe I would have been prepared with some really good questions to ask when I saw the surgeon. Things like will she ever be able to play sports, or even run normally? If she falls down hard, will it hurt her badly? Will she grow up without pain everyday? Will she have severe arthritis when she grows up?
I could go on and on about questions I still have. I always forget to ask when we go because I am so happy that she continues to make such great progress. The best advice I could give to some one who just found out is to be prepared for the worst. Most of the time with this condition surgery will be required. There are some that are lucky and it can be fixed with a harness or brace. Write out your questions so that you do not forget to ask them. Ask questions about the procedure that is necessary for the correction.
Natalie never really complained or should I say cried a lot about the cast. She adjusted very well and very quickly. She learned how to crawl or pull her self along just after 10 days. She was very determined to move. She had just learned to walk along furniture and crawl two weeks before her surgery. She was not exactly happy when she woke up and could not move, but adjusted to it better than mom and dad did.
I was happy that she learned to move around on her own in the cast. The only problem was that sometimes she would pull thread like material free and cause a spot that would irritate her skin. She would not complain; I would just notice red spots where the cast would scratch her skin.
I would fix this problem by placing medical tape around the edges of her cast. This included around the chest, or waist. It would depend on where the top of the cast was at the time. I would also put it on the ankles. I do not know how but she always managed to latch on to some toy that would pull pieces loose. When she was placed in the second cast, she had her left leg free. This where I would put tape daily because she would use this leg to push off with. This side got the worst of it.
This was just a little tip that I thought that I would share with any one who might be having this problem.
Spica casts are a bit annoying to deal with. They smell, they’re big and bulky, and they make it really hard to dress your child. They start at the chest and go all the way done to their ankles. There are a few modified versions that allow one leg to be free from the knee down, but most are completely confining.
It can be difficult enough to find clothes that fit over the top of this monstrosity, not to mention if that leg is free and it is winter. I had no choice but to put an entire outfit on her when we went anywhere because it was cold everyday. A one piece out fit works great if you are staying home, but she had to have some thing for that one leg. They do not make one legged pants at the store. I had to find something that would stretch far enough to go over the legs that were spread so far apart. I opted for stuff like leggings because they were thin and would stretch really far.
You still have to dress them light because indoors it is so warm that if you put sweat pants on them they are soaked. Not good for the child or the cast.
The time of year really does make a difference for clothing options. The summer is perfect because you can use one piece out fits for boys and cute little dresses still fit the little girls. You will want to buy them a couple of sizes too big. It is important that you dress them everyday though because you do not want food or toys to fall down into the cast.
I thought that life would be different for Natalie. I thought she would probably not be as active as other children her age. I was even prepared for her to be happy watching other children run by and she would be content to watch. I had a lot of thoughts about what having surgery and hip dysplasia would do to a small baby who was even tempered and quiet. Boy, I had another thing coming. I only have one word that truly describes our two year old and that is crazy.
She is not only active; she is more active than other kids her age. The girl is every where at one time. I thought well she might not ever run very fast, but that’s okay she will be able to walk with out hurting. The girl can run, and she can run faster than most kids her age. She has endurance, determination, and a temper to push her through what ever obstacle is in her way, which most of the time is her big sister who is six years older.
She is constantly on the move. She always has some where to go. She always has a plan, if not she will just wing it and destroy what ever is closest to her at the time.
Most people look at me funny when I say she is crazy, but the people that spend time with her all laugh. All of our family and church friends laugh because they know her so well. They know that she can be gone in the blink of an eye. This is not a child that you can let walk next to you while you are out and about because the first time she sees an opportunity she is gone. We have talked about getting her one of those backpacks that look like an animal, but they are really a leash so your kids do not get lost. We need one of those if not two that way we both have a hold on her.
Do not get me wrong, I would not change a thing about her. She has her very sweet moments as well, such as early in the morning. You know when she is jumping on the bed to wake us up on Saturdays. Why do we need to sleep past seven after she kept us up until one o’clock in the morning? She is a night owl like her dad and a morning person like my mom. The two really do not mix well for me since I am neither.
The surgery definitely changed my quiet little baby into a crazy little two year old, but to see her run, walk, play, and be happy was worth every moment in that hospital, spica cast, and brace. I am very thankful for her even though there are times I wonder what were we thinking have more than one kid. Especially, since we will be adding a third one in May. I can only say that she has worn off on us and we are a little crazy too.
There have been many question asked about how we choose the surgeon for our daughters surgery and why we choose this particular surgeon.
The truth is we didn’t really have time to search for a surgeon. She had seen her regular doctor one day and then two days later we were seeing the surgeon. The day leading up to this appointment was actually spent in physical therapy for her neck condition called torticullis. This were your child’s head may lean to one side or the other causing their neck muscles to not form properly.
I just showed up with my dad at the appointment not really aware of how serious her condition really was. Her regular doctor was only slightly concerned, so I thought, “how bad could it be?” That assumption was totally off. I wish I had been more prepared. If I had known what the next couple of months would hold, I would have tried to do more research. I probably would have come up empty handed as most of you know there is not a lot of information available on this particular topic.
We were lucky that our appointment was with a very experienced surgeon who has treated this condition for over twenty years with several success stories. Natalie’s surgeon was Dr. Sullivan from OU Children’s Center. When I looked him up this morning I found that he has actually been in practice for 39 years.
I know not every one can see the same surgeon, but I found a web site www.revolutionhealth.com that will help you search for a specific doctor or specialty. They will even give you some information on the doctor of choice. This may or may not help in your search for a good specialist. It was one of only a few that I could find and it was the easiest to navigate.
If you have any questions or concerns that you do not want to post on the site feel free to email us at contact@spicacasts.com.
Last Saturday was our oldest daughters birthday party, she turned nine. Wow she is growing up so quickly. For her birthday party we were able to rent out the Oklahoma Baptist University swimming pool and they furnished a room, etc. My wife went to one of our cousins birthday parties there and said it was extremely nice. I had no idea it was as nice as it ended up being.
Natalie had been swimming before, but this kind of stood out in my mind as I was thinking about some of the active things Natalie has done in the last few weeks. She is actually an extremely active child now days. I am constantly having to tell her to slow down as she runs through church, or make sure to hold onto her tighly in parking lots and stores because she will try to run away. However, while swimming she seemed to really enjoy it. For a couple of hours we had lifejacket on her and she was kicking around the pool, with a little help mind you, but still doing a lot of the work. I was really impressed with her stamina. You would think that with her hip displaysia it would become sore or would be quicker to tire out. She held up with everyone just fine and this is a promising sign that she will be able to play sports if she decides she wants to.
